Wednesday, March 8, 2017

California's Hundred Billion Dollar Campaign To Legislate "Fairness"

                                                                   

Okay, I thought I was immune from being shocked.  But then this past week I read an investigative report from one of those Howard Jarvis type organizations that laid out the hard numbers on how much the Democrats in Sacramento spend on "fairness initiatives".  In the last two years you Californians have spent $100 billion (yes, billion) on fairness initiatives.

First came the "babysitter law"....the mandate that Mom and Dad have to provide a permanent baby sitter with pension benefits and so many hours of "paid vacation time" per hours worked.

Then, surely you read that California banned the use of flat bottom sheets in all hotels in the states.  This law came as a result of Mexican hotel maids complaining to their union bosses that not being able to use those fitted bottom sheets put a strain on their back as they made the bed with "non-fitted" sheets.  Hotels complained, saying that those fitted sheets would not process through their laundry machines....even threatened to leave the state, then eventually succumbed and spent tens of millions on sheet launderers that might accommodate fitted sheets.

And, just this past week, as the Oroville Dam threatened to collapse, I learned that California has over 3,600 Cal Trans employees who do little more than mail in a time card every week.  California, not having the funds to fix their roads and bridges, keeps those thousands of workers on the payroll....just in case they ever have the money to fix something.  When queried, the state Department of Transportation said "it wouldn't be fair" to lay off state employees simply because funds aren't available to fix anything.    At more than $100,000 dollars a year in pay and benefits those 3,600 engineers and road graders are costing the taxpayers hundreds of millions a year.....while they sit home and watch "The View".

And this isn't new, folks.  According to a report by Howard Jarvis.Org, California's been subsidizing these Cal Trans folks for years!

But let's go on to more of these "fairness" outlays.  There's the huge costs California incurred when they implemented a spanking new Department of Motor Vehicle software program so they could sign up millions of illegal Mexicans for driver licenses (and automatically put their names on the voter rolls).

Or how about the $500 million dollars in fraudulent claims that the Employment Development Department (EDD) identified?  Alas, the state decided it would not be fair to retroactively pursue those folks and force them to pay back the money they were given.

Or how about the $500,000 a year that California pays their chancellors at each state university, or the hundreds of thousands they spend to maintain "campus mansions" for each....because it wouldn't be "fair" for those "gods of higher learning" to live in more modest abodes.  And would it be fair if the state did not spend $530,000 dollars for alcohol and university functions?

But let's not blame all that crazy spending on the state.  In 2014 the city of Los Angeles paid out $27 million dollars to settle a suit by the municipal garbage workers who were offended because the city said they couldn't take naps in their trucks!

Need I go on?  If you'd like to read hundreds of other examples, just google "Howard Jarvis. Org."  You California taxpayers will just love how "fair" your state masters are.

Sigh.

4 comments:

Jerry Carlin said...

Wow, I am living in the wrong State!

A Modest Scribler said...

Read Howard Jarvis.org, Jerry, then call the U-Haul guys.

Frank R. Krzesowiak said...

Don't bother if your an old White Man. You don't qualify for any of the 100 Billion.

A Modest Scribler said...

Probably true, Frank.